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East Oregonian
Thursday, December 14, 2017
WORKMAN: Current house has many necessary upgrades
Continued from 1A
very, very much.”
After
Les
passed,
Workman said, a series of
caregivers failed to work
out, with one only lasting a
few days.
“There’s a problem with
communication,” she said.
“If the person doesn’t know
sign, I have to write stuff
down.”
Without a care provider,
Workman can do some
things on her own, such as
cooking some small items
and washing a few dishes.
But she needs help for basic
care. Segraves recalled
bringing Workman some
food on Thanksgiving and
finding her stuck in her
kitchen. She needed help
with food and personal
hygiene, but hadn’t had
it since her previous care
provider left weeks earlier.
Segraves teared up.
“I told her, ‘Never
again,’” Segraves said.
“Call me. I’m here for you.”
Workman added that
she hasn’t had any care
providers,
except
for
Segraves, that have known
any sign language.
A different kind
of communication
Workman communicates
in American Sign Language,
and is eager to share it with
those who are interested.
She teaches twice-weekly
classes
in
downtown
Heppner, where she attracts
students young and old.
“My nine-month old
granddaughter is learning
sign language from Lelia,”
Segraves said, adding that
the baby was fascinated by
Workman’s hand move-
ments from the time she was
just a month old.
But she also communi-
cates with friends in other
states via a video phone.
If she’s talking with other
friends who are deaf, they
can just sign back and
forth. But if she’s talking
to someone that doesn’t
understand ASL, a video
interpreter will be present
and translate to the person
with whom Workman is
talking.
Her classes are full-im-
mersion in the language.
Students
can’t
speak
verbally to each other
and must communicate
completely through sign.
“I love teaching,” she
said.
A friendship
Segraves, a restaurant
AP Photo/Andrew Harnik
Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein speaks be-
fore a House Committee on the Judiciary oversight
hearing on Capitol Hill, Wednesday in Washington.
Rosenstein defends Mueller,
sees no cause for firing
Staff photo by E.J. Harris
Workman does not have a wheelchair-accessible bathroom, which makes bathing
difficult and potentially dangerous.
“She could
really throw a
pity party. But
she doesn’t.
She’s such an
inspiration.”
— Jodi, a Murray’s
Drug employee
Staff photo by E.J. Harris
Lelia Workman pets her service dog, Sam, a seven-
year-old chocolate Lab, in the kitchen of her home in
Heppner on Tuesday. Workman cannot reach the stove-
top for cooking and has no microwave so she is forced
to do all of her cooking in the oven.
owner in Heppner, met
Workman about 15 years
ago, around the time they
both moved to town. But
they didn’t really get to
be good friends until a
few months ago, when
Workman started teaching
sign language classes.
“She has a big heart,”
Segraves said. “And she
asks for nothing. She has
very little, but needs a lot.
And I’m going to help her
get it.”
Though she has four
children, Workman is not
in contact with any family
members. But she has many
friends and well-wishers
throughout Heppner.
Before her wheelchair
broke, she would go
downtown several times a
week, where the employees
of Murray’s Drug and
Breaking Grounds Coffee
look forward to seeing her.
“She’s always so happy,”
said Tayllor Brannon of
Breaking Grounds. “We all
know the hand signs — and
she has a usual back here.”
That “usual” is a large
strawberry Italian soda with
cream and whipped cream.
“My little brothers in the
winter go grocery shopping
for her,” Brannon said.
“And with the sign language
classes she’s doing, the
whole town’s involved.”
“She could really throw
a pity party,” said Jodi, a
Murray’s Drug employee.
“But she doesn’t. She’s such
an inspiration.”
Problems
But issues remain. Her
home, where she’s lived
for five years, is not ADA-
friendly.
Segraves has set up a
GoFundMe page, with
a goal of raising enough
money to either redo parts of
Workman’s house to make
them ADA-compliant, or to
find her a new place to live.
“Right now, we’re in a
catch-22,” Segraves said.
“We’re praying, hoping, that
maybe there’s a house for
us.”
Workman’s current house
needs many upgrades. The
ramp needs to be repaired.
Outdoor lighting, a new
gate and an upgraded fence
need to be installed. She
also needs new locks on
her doors, and doorways
must be widened so they are
easier for her wheelchair to
navigate.
Perhaps one of the
most important changes,
Segraves said, is making
the bathroom handicap-ac-
cessible. As of now, she has
to be moved into a tub on a
transfer board.
Lelia’s
GoFundMe
website is available at
https://www.gofundme.
com/lelia-project.
———
Contact
Jayati
Ramakrishnan
at
jramakrishnan@eastorego-
nian.com or 541-564-4534
COUNCIL: Milton-Freewater, Pilot Rock open meetings with prayer
Continued from 1A
the First Amendment’s
Establishment
Clause,
which bars the government
from favoring one religion
over another.
But a 2014 ruling from
the U.S. Supreme Court
made legislative prayers
legally permissible.
In Town of Greece v.
Galloway, the court consid-
ered the case of a separation
of church and state group
suing a New York town
over its practice of having
local chaplains lead the
council in prayer. By a 5-4
vote, the court determined
that prayers were allowable
at public meetings as long
as they met a certain set of
conditions.
“In a nutshell, they
rationalized that it’s a part
of our history and our First
Amendment doesn’t require
non-religion,” Kerns said.
If the Pendleton City
Council were to adopt
invocations at its meetings,
Kerns had a lengthy set of
recommendations to ensure
the council complied with
the supreme court’s ruling.
According to a memo
written by Kerns, a member
of the city council or munic-
ipal employee could not
lead the invocation because
it would give the appearance
of endorsing a religious
viewpoint.
Instead, the city would
need to invite a rotating
group of religious leaders
to perform each opening
prayer. Kerns said the
council would need to
appoint someone to maintain
a list of people to deliver the
invocation.
Even obscure religions,
like Rastafarianism, would
be eligible for the list, Kerns
said.
The prayers themselves
Staff photo by E.J. Harris
Pendleton mayor asks about the possibility of recit-
ing the Pledge of Allegiance before city council meet-
ings during a Pendleton City Council work session on
Tuesday in Pendleton.
needed to be “brief, solemn
and respectful in tone,”
and could not reference a
specific deity, like Jesus
Christ.
The Umatilla County
Board of Commissioners
don’t do an invocation, and
neither do the four cities on
the west side of the county
— Hermiston, Umatilla,
Stanfield and Echo.
But both Milton-Free-
water and Pilot Rock open
their legislative meetings
with prayer.
Both cities have been
doing invocations at public
meetings longer than their
top administrators have
worked there, although their
practices stray from Kerns’
suggested guidelines.
Milton-Freewater City
Manager Linda Hall said
members of the city council
lead the invocation on a
rotating basis.
Along with asking about
their food allergies and
where to send their agenda
packets, Hall said the city
checks if incoming council
members would be comfort-
able leading an opening
prayer. If they are, they’re
added to the rotation.
Teri Porter, Pilot Rock’s
city recorder, said a local
pastor leads the invocation
for every meeting. If he’s
not available, a represen-
tative for the pastor or a
member of the council leads
the prayer.
Neither Hall or Porter
said they have received
complaints
from
any
community members about
the invocations.
“Nobody has questioned
it all,” Porter said. “It’s just
common and expected.”
Down a prayer,
up a pledge
Despite
Chalmers’
request, the councilors
didn’t seem eager to incor-
porate prayers into their
meetings.
Councilor Scott Fairley
said he grew up in a secular
household and had always
been uncomfortable with
prayers at public meetings.
On a less personal level,
Fairley said he’s spoken
with several citizens since
the issue was brought up and
the reaction was universally
against invocations. He said
the people he spoke to felt
prayers were best left for
people to do on their own
time rather than in public
meetings.
Councilor Dale Primmer
repeated some of the
concerns Fairley heard and
added his own thoughts.
“We came into this
council fairly focused on
goals,” he said. “I’m just
afraid this will turn into
a distraction and this will
be something we’ll be
responding to.”
For his part, Chalmers
said he could have his own
reflections on God and
didn’t want to impose his
own beliefs on anyone else.
“There’s no magic or
whatever to an invocation,”
he said. “That can happen
24/7 if you so choose.”
Chalmers said invo-
cations didn’t need to be
forced into the process,
but he noted that it was “a
sad state of affairs” that it
wasn’t the norm.
While
invocations
weren’t gaining much
traction with the council,
another early meeting ritual
drew more council support
— the pledge of allegiance.
Councilor Becky Marks
viewed it as a unifying
experience.
“If we are able to stand
together and say the pledge,
then we know, at least for
that one moment, we’re all
together,” she said. “I think
it makes our arguments
stronger. I think it makes
our compromises stronger.”
Some members of the
council viewed it as a
reaffirmation of the oath the
council takes when they’re
sworn in.
Mayor John Turner said
he could add the pledge of
allegiance to the agenda as
soon as the Jan. 2 meeting.
———
Contact Antonio Sierra
at asierra@eastoregonian.
com or 541-966-0836.
WASHINGTON (AP)
— Deputy Attorney General
Rod Rosenstein, facing
congressional
questions
about anti-Donald Trump
text messages exchanged
between two FBI officials
assigned to the Russia
probe, defended special
counsel Robert Mueller on
Wednesday and said he had
seen no cause to fire him
and had not been pressured
to do so.
Rosenstein
appeared
before the House Judiciary
Committee one day after
the Justice Department
provided
congressional
committees with hundreds
of text messages between
an FBI counterintelligence
agent assigned to Mueller’s
team and an FBI lawyer
who was on the same detail.
Those messages, which
occurred before Mueller
was appointed in May to
investigate potential coordi-
nation between Russia and
the Trump campaign, show
the officials using words
like “idiot” and “loathsome
human” to characterize
Trump as he was running
for president in 2016. One
of the officials said in an
election night text that the
prospect of a Trump victory
was “terrifying.”
The disclosures of the
text messages added to
concerns among members
of Congress that Mueller’s
team is tainted by political
bias.
But when Rosenstein was
asked by lawmakers if he
had seen good cause to fire
Mueller, whom he appointed
and whose work he oversees,
he replied that he had not.
Rosenstein also defended
the credentials of Mueller,
a former FBI director, and
said he was an appropriate
choice to run the Justice
Department’s Russia investi-
gation after the firing of FBI
Director James Comey.
“The special counsel’s
investigation is not a witch
hunt,” Rosenstein said in
response to questions about
whether he agreed with
Trump’s characterization
of the probe. “The indepen-
dence and integrity of the
investigation are not going
to be affected by anything
that anyone says.”
Peter Strzok, a veteran
FBI
counterintelligence
agent, was removed over
the summer from Muel-
ler’s team following the
discovery of text messages
exchanged with Lisa Page,
an FBI lawyer who was
also detailed this year to the
group of agents and prose-
cutors investigating poten-
tial coordination between
Russia and Trump’s Repub-
lican campaign.
“When
we
have
evidence of any inappro-
priate conduct, we’re going
to take action on it. That’s
what Mr. Mueller did here.
As soon as he learned about
this issue, he took action,”
Rosenstein said.
Hundreds
of
the
messages, which surfaced
in a Justice Department
inspector general investi-
gation of the FBI’s inquiry
into Democrat Hillary Clin-
ton’s use of a private email
server, were being provided
to congressional commit-
tees and were reviewed by
The Associated Press on
Tuesday night.
Rosenstein
acknowl-
edged in response to
Democratic questioning that
reporters were invited to the
Justice Department to review
the messages — which was
unusual given that they were
part of an ongoing watchdog
report — but said that deci-
sion was acceptable because
the information was deter-
mined to be “appropriate for
public release.”
MARIJUANA: Police found items
used for making butane honey oil
Continued from 1A
Police found a handgun
and ID card inside the
vehicle and began following
the clues, including speaking
to several sources. That led
them to the Sunland Apart-
ments at 1630 W. Sunland
Ave., Apartment B8, where
they found Rhoades.
In the apartment police
found a large stash of mari-
juana, packaging materials,
scales, items used for a
butane honey oil laboratory,
two rifles and two handguns.
Butane honey oil is a mari-
juana extract created through
a highly volatile process that
can cause explosions.
Rhoades was arrested on
charges of attempt to elude,
reckless driving, hit and
run, first-degree theft, illegal
possession, delivery and
manufacturing of marijuana,
and felon in possession of a
firearm. He was booked into
the Umatilla County Jail,
Pendleton, where a charge of
failure to appear was added
on an unrelated warrant.
“Though Oregon has
decriminalized marijuana,
the amounts of marijuana
being sold on the black
market continues to be stag-
gering as evidenced by this
seizure,” Hermiston Police
Chief Jason Edmiston said
in the press release.
SHOOTING: Reddington has been
with Pendleton police for 11 years
Continued from 1A
District Attorney Dan
Primus said his office has
a conflict. Primus has not
stated what that conflict
is, but Reddington’s wife,
Brandi Reddington, is an
investigator for the district
attorney.
Lehman is a field training
officer and the police dog
handler for Pendleton.
He worked for Pendleton
police in 2011 from
February to late December,
when he resigned after a
confrontation in a bar. The
department hired him again
in mid-2012.
Tyler Reddington has
been with Pendleton police
for 11 years. He is a member
of the police department’s
SWAT team, instructor for
the state’s required physical
abilities test and the director
of officer field training.
This is his second
shooting.
Reddington shot and
injured Timothy Jay Faria
during a drug raid early
in the morning of Dec. 6,
2012, at 411 N.W. Eighth
St., Pendleton. Primus
was the district attorney
at the time and said Faria
displayed a weapon and
threatened the officer.
Hoisington, 38, remains
in a Portland hospital, but
is feeling well enough to
make comments on social
media and have visitors.
Umatilla
County
Circuit Court records show
Hoisington has convictions
going back to 2005 for
driving under the influence
of intoxicants, felony hit
and run, felon in possession
of a firearm, and recklessly
endangering others.